Unreality
by instantxkarma
Summary: (in the process of a rewrite. This story is abandoned) When a mysterious, faceless man moves in next door, a lonely and defiant Christine begins to wonder if maybe she's not really alone. But is he more sinister than he seems or is something else behind the strange happenings? Modern day, Leroux based.
1. At the Psychiatrist

-1**A/N: Obviously don't own the characters.**

**I'm pretty much a Leroux purist, so it slays me to modernize the story, but I just had to do it. This idea's been swimming in my brain lately. This is my first attempt at something that isn't completely original, so let me know what you think!**

**PS: If anyone is a good reader for aesthetics (rhythm, sound, images etc) please let me know. I have a pretty good sense of grammar, but I'd love to have an impartial ear on those other fronts.**

---

"So why are you here today?"

The psychiatrist is a fat and homely man, writing with a fat pen in a homely notebook. The office smells like cigars and rotting wood.

Christine kicks indecisively at the lime green carpet, avoiding his eyes. "I don't know."

"Come now." His voice is low and cigarette burned; it reminds her entirely too much of her dad's. "You know why you're here. We can't help you if you can't acknowledge a problem"

The sound of his shifting positions makes Christine uneasy. "I'm here because I was sent here, and I don't really think I have a problem. I don't really think I need to be here."

"Okay." He scribbles furiously in his little notebook. The room is small and ugly- everything ugly and small and claustrophobic- and decorated with clashing lime green carpet and burnt orange wallpaper. The psychiatrist's desk overflows with papers and drawings and filled up tattered notebooks. There are several crayon drawings on it, labeled with children's names and ages. Christine recognizes none of the names, but she knows the drawings: she could have done them herself at three or four or five. They are emotions, portraits of happy days with parents, anger at the school bully, the sadness of a pet dying or loneliness of time spent away from home. More frightening are distorted drawings of monsters and hallucinations and faces barely recognizable as human. Christine knows these drawings, too. "Well, then, let's try it this way. Why did your... why were you sent here?"

"I was sent here by the hospital." More furious scribbles from the fat psychiatrist. "I had a toothache and took some vicodan for it and then some Tylenol. I must have took too much because it made me really sick and you know how you can get..." She pauses for a minute and bites her lip, then continues, speaking more deliberately. "I was just worried, so I went to the hospital, and they kept me. For three frigging days."

The psychiatrist nods and then looks up from his notebook. "So, the hospital kept you for three days."

Christine still hasn't looked up at him. "Quit that active listening crap. Does anyone actually buy it?" She picks her nails and then her cuticles, pausing carefully to look out the window. She doesn't know if she's waiting for a response.

"It's not crap, Christine. I want you to know that I understand what you're saying." He leans in closer and tries to engage her with his eyes, tries to look fatherly and sympathetic.

"Whatever, I know you learn all about that in first year psychology. I took that course."

He writes in his notebook, a few looping words, then makes a small hmm sound. "Alright, at any rate, why did they keep you for three days? Did you hurt yourself that much?"

"No, nah, I mean, they tested my blood and I was fine. My levels weren't dangerous." The view out the window is spectacular; it's a two part bay window, facing the city diagonally. The whole sprawl is laid out, rising and falling with the belly of the land, and in the distance, past a sea of offices and houses is the high rise cluster of downtown. It's shrouded in a thick brown cloud, but the sky above the smog is a crisp winter blue.

"Well, then why?" The psychiatrist has set the notebook on his knee, and is leaning towards her, his elbow on his other knee and his chin in his palm.

"I don't know. They didn't believe the toothache story. And my potassium was way off, so they kept me in psychiatric and health observation for the 'required by law' seventy two hours. And then I got a referral here and my dad made me come so here I am." She finally meets his eyes and spreads her palms open, shrugging a bit.

He watches her for a moment, blank or captivated, then returns his pen to his notebook and falls silent while he takes notes. After a long pause, he looks back to her, but she has averted her eyes again. "The fact that you yourself called it a story indicates to me that it may not be entirely true, that you took some medication for a toothache. I am particularly worried about you taking controlled, prescription medication."

"You can't be worried about me, you don't even know me!" Christine bites her bottom lip, hard, and her eyes go big and black and unfocused. The claustrophobic little room, the psychiatrist, both gone.

He watches her then shakes his head. "I know you're a beautiful young woman with a lot of potential. I know that anyone in their right mind would only want the best for you." He smiles and waits, but she offers no response. "Is there anything else you'd like to talk about today?" Still, no response. He follows her gaze out the window, to a circling hawk, and they both watch it for a long, silent while. "Are you sad, Christine?"

She only shakes her head, and looks at her watch. "Our time is up."

He sighs and stands up while straightening his slacks. "So it is. Will you please send your father in? I'd like to talk to him, just for a second."

Christine stands, silently and gracefully, picking up her purse and coat. She exits the tiny room without another word, pushing through the oak door to the waiting room, her stick thin body weighed down by the heavy coat and oversized purse. Her father sits anxiously in one corner, crossing and uncrossing his legs, reading Sports Illustrated. He looks suddenly older, gaunt and pale, but he smiles hopefully when he sees her. "How did it go, honey?"

She only shrugs. "Okay, I don't know, ask him." The psychiatrist stands in the doorway, smiling. "He wants to talk to you, I'm going to go downstairs to the vending machines or something, I'll meet you down there." Her father nods and stands as Christine brushes by him. She turns, guilty, and smiles at both the men, but their backs are turned now as they enter the horrible little office.

Outside the door, she drops her purse and faces the office label to put on her white winter coat. "Dr. Millard Pediatric Psychiatry." She reads the sign out loud- a habit she's had since she can remember- as she struggles to put her arm in the left sleeve of her coat; suddenly, the coat is lifted for her, strange hands help her put it on. "Holy shit!" She turns quickly to find herself face to face with a tall, thin man in a ski mask. She almost stumbles into him. "I mean, sorry mister. Pardon my French." He looks a bit older, in his late thirties, and she doesn't want to offend a total stranger. She can see him smile under the heavy black ski mask.

"It's quite alright. I may have overstepped some boundaries myself." He smiles wider. His voice is quiet but deep and clean, melodic and untainted.

All Christine can see is the reflection of herself in his sunglasses, and she pauses staring at his covered face for a moment. "Well, thank you, it's fine, I have to go... outside... though now so thank you and adieu." She stoops to pick up her purse but the strange man remains standing there.

"Well, what a coincidence. I was going outside myself. Do you mind if I walk you there?" The strange man is wearing thin leather gloves and a heavy leather coat over a casual black designer suit, but the bulkiness of the clothes does nothing to disguise his lankiness.

"Sure, I guess. I was just going to go smoke a cigarette or something, I don't know, I mean, there's only one elevator." The ski mask is making her nervous. She loops her purse over her shoulder, but it slides right back down to her elbow.

"There is only one elevator."

"You're not going to murder me or something, right?" She chuckles a little to herself.

"Probably." He stands stone still and serious for a minute, then chuckles too. "The elevator is a little obvious for my tastes."

Christine widens her eyes then laughs again, way too high pitched and nervous. She turns away from him without a word and walks toward the elevator; she can hear him following. She didn't notice his shoes, but they sound like nice ones, especially once they move from carpet to the linoleum around the elevator hall. They're not clunky or plastic sounding like boots; instead, they click like women's heels.

She pushes the button and turns to him again. This time he's minding his personal space, standing a few feet away but smiling graciously at her- at least, as best she can tell, looking at the ski mask. She takes note of his shoes, which are leather with laces and polished to a dramatic high sheen.

The elevator dings and the doors open, and he nods to her to go ahead, then follows quickly behind. When they're both in, she reaches to push the button, but he does it first, bowing a bit in an old fashioned way. "Allow me." They both stand facing each other as the elevator drops the fourteen floors down to the ground level.

They both walk out the doors of the building to stand outside, Christine leading the way, the strange man following behind. He hardly makes a sound, other than his shoes; she rustles her coat when she walks. Outside it's a blue sky winter day, with a few wisps of clouds rising over the horizon. It is bitterly cold.

"Well, I leave you here. I have an appointment to keep." The stranger bows slightly and brings his fingertips up to his cheek. "There really is no reason to be so lonely, Christine. You're young and beautiful, you could have the world at your feet." His hands come together and intertwine, gracefully, lightly, almost as though his hands themselves suffered from a great sadness.

She is transfixed momentarily by the hands, which then wave her a small goodbye as he walks away. The stranger strides, catlike, to the edge of the building while Christine digs in her purse for a cigarette, then lights it. She stands breathing the smoke and cold air momentarily until suddenly, she turns to the corner of the building he disappeared around. "Hey, wait!" Her breath makes great billowing clouds as she yells. "How did you know my name?"


	2. A New Neighbor

-1**A/N: I so owe my friend Laura like ten pints for rereading this for me and not thinking I'm a giant geek.**

---

Christine sits with her elbow on the window frame. The window is half cracked and the bitter cold whips her hair into her eyes. She doesn't flinch. "What did he say about me?"

"Hm?" Her father is a thin man, with premature wrinkles around the mouth and eyes. Frown lines. He's quiet and has a meek air about him, something his daughter didn't inherit; she did end up with his quiet, gravelly voice and thin frame, though.

"The psychiatrist. What did he say?"

Her father sits for a minute, then turns to her as they come to a stop light. "He said you were unwilling to talk. He said you weren't very cooperative, and..." He trails off as the light changes and he jerks the car around a corner.

"And what, pops?"

"And he asked if I thought it was a mistake, or on purpose." When he swings his head to his daughter, she is looking at him. His eyes are sad and pleading light grey, with a red rim. They seem too old for his face and suddenly Christine is fighting tears.

She rubs her eyes. "You know it was an accident dad, you know I didn't mean to. I was stupid and didn't read the bottle but really I didn't want to hurt you or anything like that, you know me. I promise dad." She suddenly seems very small to him, pressed into the car seat. Her coat is swallowing her.

The wind through the window crack hisses and whistles, filling the silence, and for a few moments both of them look at the road. Christine's father turns back to her suddenly. "The vicodan worries him too." She starts to make a noise, but he cuts her off, "-and the potassium levels, he didn't say anything, but they're worrying me. Christine, you told me you wouldn't start that again!"

"Daddy, I-" She pauses and then drops it, staring out the window again. She knows she can't explain herself this time.

They're silent the rest of the way home.

-----

The clouds close in around the house rapidly. Christine lays curled up on her bedroom floor, shivering, watching the storm clouds move in. She can see lightning flicker deep in them, and tiny snowflakes are starting to fall intermittently out her window. The bitter cold has let up a bit, and she can feel the moisture building in the air, threatening. It's going to be a long and heavy storm.

Her father is banging around downstairs. "Chris!" He bangs around some more, then runs up to her room; she can hear his footsteps outside her door. "Christine!"

"Don't open the door dad, I'm naked."

"Oh, okay." He shifts his weight audibly and leans against the door; she watches nervously, hoping it doesn't pop open. "Well, honey, I'm going to run to the store before the storm comes in. Is there anything you want?"

"No daddy, I'm fine."

Her father dissolves into a loud fit of coughing, but he tries to stifle it. "Alright, well-" The coughing resumes, and, unable to speak anymore, he just taps out a rhythm on her door. Christine can hear him coughing all the way downstairs and out the house.

She sighs, relieved, and sits up, her bones digging painfully into the hardwood floor. She brings her knees up to her chest and sits there, wheezing, until she finally builds the strength to stand up and walk to her closet. The closet is small and packed, mostly with things that no longer fit. Finally, she decides on an oversized sweater and pulls it on over her t-shirt.

Goosebumps rise all over Christine's body when she walks downstairs. The town house is small but cozy, plenty enough for two people, and well decorated. She runs her fingers down the wall on the staircase, over the chest in the living room, across the bookshelf and again over the wall on the way to the front door. The security door is locked. She picks up her coat from the back of their living room couch and puts it on over her sweater, zipping it all the way to her neck. In her pocket is her spare pack of cigarettes.

She unlocks the door and stands out on her front porch, barefoot, shivering. The storm is still building. The roads and sidewalk are dry, but not for long- tiny flurries still fall all down the street, threatening something far more severe. Christine watches the sky as she smokes.

The rustling in the bushes next to her patio frightens her out of her reverie. She almost jumps, but instead spins on her heels, facing the little shrubs. "Who's there?" The minute ticks of snowflakes are the only sounds. She narrows her eyes at the bushes.

A little squirrel, cold and alone, skitters out and stares accusingly at Christine before chattering and bounding away. She has to laugh at herself for her paranoia. The cigarette is finished, and she puts it out in one of the empty plant pots on her patio before throwing it into the little bush.

As she is about to go in, another sound comes from the porch next to hers. It's a man's voice, humming to himself, and she can hear his feet shuffling and his body bouncing against the cold.

The town home next to hers has been vacant since she and her father moved in eight months ago. As far as they could tell, it was vacant before that, maybe even since the fairly new subdivision was built. This wasn't unusual: the area was developed very quickly, and many apartments, town homes, and even whole houses stood empty, victims of an over inflated pricing market.

Christine peers over the little evergreen shrub that grows in between the porches. At best, she only gets an obscured view of the man, a glimpse of an arm, a torso, a bit of hair. She sticks her hand straight up in the air and waves. "Hey, neighbor!"

The man turns to her as if he is startled.

"Sorry, I didn't mean to scare you. Did you just move in?"

"Oh, hello, yeah, today is my first day."

Christine nods, then remembers the man can't see her. "Well, yeah, let us know, maybe my dad will bring you a housewarming gift or something, anyway let us know if you need anything." She fights the feeling that she recognizes his voice. Just a little something about it is familiar.

"I most surely will. Thanks for the offer." He sticks his hand up over the shrub and waves at her. He's wearing black mittens and a black down coat.

Christine waves again and then steps into the warmth of her house.

-----

"We've got a new neighbor." Christine is sitting on the downstairs leather couch, flipping through television channels and biting the cuticles of her other hand.

Her dad is barely in the door. "That's nice, help bring in groceries please and thank you." He's weighed down with four or five bags, all filled.

"God, did you buy the store?" She slips on some flip flops and goes out the back door to her father's car, parked in the lot under the carport. The trunk of the Lumina is packed with groceries, which overflow to the back seat; Christine clucks her tongue and yells down to the basement door, "I hope it's not the apocalypse, pops!" She picks up the lightest bags she can find and loops them over her arms, five, six, seven at a time.

Under one of the bags is a little yellow carbon copy of a doctor's checkup notes. She looks at it, head tilted, leaning down closer, until she can make out the words- chest x-ray, return for follow up. She stands abruptly and hits her head on the trunk lid when she hears her dad coming.

He is coughing all the way. "Hey dad?" Her voice is almost a whisper, "you had a chest x-ray?"

Her dad just smiles and stifles one last cough. "I just have this cough, they wanted to make sure nothing was wrong."

"Well, is it?"

He shakes his head and walks up next to her, picking up more bags of groceries. "I don't know, they told me to come back next week to find out." He starts walking away with his armload of groceries, leaving her standing and leaning into the trunk.

"Wait! Why didn't you tell me, don't you think I should know about this stuff? Aren't we family, and family is supposed to pull each other through everything, right dad?"

He turns to her, his eyes authoritative, yet immeasurably sad. "Some things I'm going through I need to deal with on my own, Chris." And he turns around again, kicking the door open wider.

"Why can't you let me deal with **my **problems on my own, then, instead of dragging me to a psychiatrist, huh dad?"

He stops for a second, shakes his head a bit, then walks through the door. Christine scoops up a couple more bags, then stomps in the house.

-----

Christine is watching the neighbor's porch from across the street. She's sitting in the bed of a random truck, bundled in her white coat, as the snow falls on her shoulders and head. She is waiting for the man to come out, for a moving truck to arrive, or any other sign of life. But all the lights are out in the house, and she hasn't seen or heard anything from the man since their first contact earlier.

She is humming to herself, smoking cigarette after cigarette, just watching. Her coat conceals her in the heavy snow. The only sign of her presence is the smoke wafting out from under her hood; she wants to feel like an invisible ghost, lost in between the paths of snowflakes.

Finally the door of the neighbor's house cracks, if only a tiny bit. Still, there are no lights on. She narrows her eyes to see more clearly through the blowing snow; she thinks she sees a dark figure glide across the entryway, but isn't totally sure. She knows she hears quiet music coming from inside, a single violin, but it's no song she recognizes.

The sound invites her to come forward, and she does, slinking off the truck and hiding again behind a shrub facing the mysterious neighbor's town home. The door slams shut as Christine watches, which only makes her want to move closer. She sneaks across the street after she's sure the neighbor can't see her, and hides behind the scruffy pine tree growing in his bit of the front lawn. The music has stopped. Once again, there is no sign of life.

She finally steels herself to approaching his door, and with a side long glance at her porch, she leaves her spot behind the bush and walks up his porch steps. _This is silly_, she tells herself, _what's he going to think of me now? I shouldn't be spying, I should just go back in._

But it's too late to walk away. Christine knocks, once, quietly, then again, pounding louder. There is no response. She knocks again, ready to bolt, and the door cracks a bit, but there is still no sign of the man.

She sticks her head in the door. "Hello?" She takes one step in, she closes her eyes a little, frightened. The place smells musty, damp, but like roses too, as though they're growing somewhere in the house. "I heard your music," she half-shouts, "and I just wanted to see if I could come listen because I play violin and I sing too and you really sounded beautiful..." She trails off, looking around. There is nothing in the little town home, and though the floor plan is identical to her own, it's barely recognizable. The walls are stark white, the entryway and living room are totally bare. The stairs lead up to a black hole; as far as she can tell, not a single light is on in the whole place.

She runs her fingers along the living room wall, as she would at home. "Hello?" No response, no sound. "Hello?" She stops just short of the stair well that leads to the upstairs. Her ears prick. There is the sound of a floorboard creaking, then silence that is too silent. The pause reminds her of the sound of a tiger she saw once on the National Geographic channel, every step measured, metered, timed, until the big cat steps on a snapping twig, and then freezes, afraid to alert his prey. She plays out the hunt in her mind. She knows what the bolting gazelle feels.

Suddenly, the violin music starts up again. It's coming from upstairs. Christine is completely transfixed by it, it's like nothing she's ever heard before in her life. So melancholic, but at the same time, so passionate. She can hear the first movement come to an end.

Then the voice. Christine can do nothing but search for it. She walks up the stairs in a trance, turning her head to every door to find the voice, to tell it how amazing it is. The song lifts and falls, minor notes fill every corner of the upstairs hallway, no words, only pure unadulterated music. Still, it speaks: a song about loneliness, about death and the search for another who understands it, a search for love, a futile search.

The singing is unearthly, and so big, it surrounds her, fills her. She stands with her eyes closed, letting it do what it will. The lights are off. There is no sound but the voice.

As suddenly as it started, the singing stops, and Christine almost falls to the floor like a marionette with cut strings. She opens her eyes and realizes she is in her neighbor's house, whom she knows nothing about, and all the lights are off, and nobody in the world knows where she is. She puts one foot forward to run out the door, but the voice is behind her; without an alerting sound, it's there in her ear, and she can feel the hot breath of the singer.

Even though he speaks, the music is in his voice. "It's bad manners to be in another's home without their permission." Christine knows she is dead. The back of her head burns with pain, and she can feel herself slump to the floor as everything goes black.


	3. Packages

**A/N: Thank you guys for the kind comments. I'm thrilled you all are liking it so far. Keep reading and reviewing- your enjoyment is my motivation.**

**As for which characters will show up, well, you'll just have to keep reading to see, won't you?**

---

Christine's eyes shoot open.

It is evening, and the snow is falling in wide white brush strokes. She can see out her window that the whole neighborhood is covered, the bare branches of trees frosted all around, the town homes across the street rimmed with fat icicles.

She immediately jumps out of bed and wraps her comforter around her, shivering against the cold, then walks to her father's room. "Dad?" He is not there. "Da-ad!"

The house is empty, quiet. She pads downstairs to the living room and twirls around, blinking the sleep out of her eyes, before she focuses on the glass security door; her father is sitting silently out on the porch. He has his arms wrapped around himself, and he's coatless and shivering slightly.

"Dad!" Christine bound out the door and wraps her arms around him; he turns to her and smiles without his eyes.

"You woke up. I was worried."

"Yeah, how long was I out for?" Christine wraps the comforter around her father's shoulders and sits next to him so it warms them both.

"A couple hours." He smiles at her again, pulling the blanket in to him, closing his eyes for a second. "He brought you back home." He nods to the mysterious neighbor's house, then wipes the snow from his eyelashes. "What were you doing out in the snow, Chris?"

She doesn't know what to say. She doesn't know what is real, or what actually happened, and she has no idea what to tell her dad. "I was just sitting outside."

"Good thing he found you, or you'd be frozen out in a snow drift all night, and I'd be driving around the city looking for you. You have to be more careful, honey." He goes to stand up, but she clutches his forearm, stopping him.

"You mean he found me passed out outside?" She tries to read his eyes.

"You don't remember?"

She lets him go, and he stands up, looking down at her sternly. "Yeah, I mean, yes of course I remember, I think I fell and hit my head dad, I'm sure you have every right to be angry." She lets a breath out through pursed lips and fights looking relieved. So maybe it was all a dream, and she never did break in to her neighbor's house.

"Well, I'm not angry. I just wonder whether that's the whole truth." He opens the door to step inside. His hair and his shoulders are covered with shimmering flakes of snow.

Christine nods. "It **is **the whole truth, Dad. I promise!" She watches him walk into the house, then stands up, pulling the blanket around her again. She looks to the neighboring town home, where the lights are off, and the house is silent and foreboding. It's as though no one could possibly be there. She must have been dreaming; she can't imagine a voice that beautiful being real.

Finally, she pulls the door open with one arm and swings her head around, looking for her father. "Hey dad?" she shouts, and waits for a response.

"What, Chris?" He sounds tired, worn out. He is downstairs.

Christine steps into the house. "Did he tell you his name or anything?"

"Um..." There is some banging from downstairs, then silence. "I think he said it was Aaron... or... no. Erik. Erik something, I don't remember his last name."

---

She is walking around the strange little market, running her fingers over all the shelves and salivating when she passes the sweets. They're marked in foreign languages, Russian, Italian, French, words she can almost taste, even if she doesn't understand. She stares through the glass, chewing on her right thumb nail. The clerk eyes her suspiciously.

"Can I help you find something in particular?"

Christine is pulled out of her food fantasies, and looks at the clerk. She's a fat Eastern European-looking woman, with her short curly hair stuffed under a hair net. Her apron is covered in food stains. "Um," says Christine, "I think I'm looking for cheese."

"For yourself?" The woman perks up, but still seems wary of Christine.

"Well, my neighbor did me a big favor, and I think I want to give him something nice, but I don't know him very well, so I don't know if he likes cheese." Christine's eyes are caught by a basket of fresh figs, and she swallows hard.

"I see." The clerk puts her index finger to her lips as she thinks. "Well, something very mild then. How about fresh baby mozzarella?" She holds up a little container of white globs floating in cloudy water.

The sight disgusts Christine; she shudders minutely. "Uh, no, I don't think so. I was thinking something more refined."

"Brie?"

"That's it!" The figs once again catch Christine's eye. "The best Brie you have, and some of those figs and some salami or something, nice things please."

The clerk rolls her eyes a little bit, but gathers all the things Christine wants, and puts them in a little white bag. "That's $41.58."

"Sure." She digs through her purse, then finds her little black wallet, pulling out a fifty dollar bill. "Here, keep the change." And Christine takes her purchase and walks out of the shop, digging through the food; her mouth waters, but she only closes the bag, clutching it determinedly as she strides to the bus stop.

---

She watches out her window at the basket she left on his porch. _At least the snow stopped falling_, she thinks. But it is thigh deep outside, and Christine struggled to walk even the few feet to her neighbor's porch to drop the basket. She rang the doorbell three or four times, but there was no answer; it looks like nobody is home.

She can see in the living room window. It never looks like anyone is home, with the dark windows, the uncleared walkway, the snowed-in porch. It might have remained vacant, for all the difference the man has made to the appearance of the place.

The night before, though, when Christine was sitting in her room arranging the little gift basket, writing the note to append to it, she heard the violin music again. It was joyful this time: a bittersweet joyfulness, and the instrument sang in a very human way. Christine had sat for many minutes, listening, waiting for the voice to come, but it never did. The song finally stopped, and the little town home was silent and dark again.

She runs the words of her note through her head over and over. She never intended to meet him face to face; she would drop the basket on his porch and the note would explain it all. She bites her lip. She had written the note in her best handwriting, and it was simple: a thank you and good neighborly wishes. She left it unsigned.

Christine gasps as the door cracks. One ungloved hand reaches out on the porch and pulls the basket inside, shaking the snow off the bottom just outside the door. The basket and the hand disappear into the dark house, and she is left watching, rubbing her eyes.

Her dad shouts up the stairs after her, "Dinner, Chris!"

"Okay!" But she's pinned to the window, resting her elbows on the ledge, body contorted so she can see the next door porch. She doesn't move. "Actually, pops, I'm not that hungry," she shouts without turning her head. The empty porch has her transfixed, as though her mysterious neighbor brought the basket in by magic.

She can hear her father's exaggerated sigh.

---

Her father is gone. The note is posted on her door- Doctor's appt. be back later. The morning sun is shining on the snow, and the snow glimmers, blinding Christine when she looks out her window. Her first thought is her neighbor; his door is shut and his house is dark, as usual. She sighs.

Christine gets out of bed and looks in her mirror- she feels ugly in the morning, her blonde hair ratted and tousled, her eyes sunken and face mashed in the shape of her pillow. The winter sun illuminates her room.

She pulls her hair back in a loose ponytail, combing it with her fingers, and ties it with a scrunchie pulled off her door knob, then looks in the mirror again. A little better. She is still wearing yesterday's clothes.

Her coat is downstairs, lying on the couch. She picks it up and digs through the pockets, pulls out her pack of cigarettes and a lighter, and steps out on the porch without her coat. There is only one cigarette left in the pack; she is distracted with this fact, and almost trips over the little package that sits on her front doormat.

She is startled by its presence, then kneels down to inspect it. It is small and messy, wrapped in a strange green foil paper; she picks it up, turns it over, and then over again, brings it up to her nose and smells it. Christine turns her head both ways, trying to identify where the package came from, but the only footsteps in the snow are her father's. She brings the little package inside.

She's not sure if the package is for her or her father, but she can hardly resist opening it. The foil wrapping crinkles merrily as she peels it off; under the wrapping is a small handwritten note, and another wrapped package. She laughs a little.

The note is a piece of plain lined paper, folded up into a little square, labeled _Christine_ on the outside. She unfolds it as quickly as she can, with slightly shaking hands.

_Christine:_

The handwriting is awkward, smeared, and childlike, and the note is written in red pen. It looks hurried, but the words are well thought out:

_I hope you are able to appreciate your father's loving worry, in time. I have, at this point, spared your good-hearted father any unnecessary anxiousness; I suggest you make every effort to do the same, in light of his condition. _

_You are welcome to return to my home, **when invited. ** I would kindly advise you to better mind your manners in the future, as is becoming of a lady._

_You have mature tastes for such a young woman. Your thoughtfulness is wonderful, but allow me to introduce you to real fine cuisine._

_Obediently yours,_

_Erik._

So it wasn't a dream, she had actually entered the stranger's house, and heard the angel's voice. Had she fainted then? He must have caught her and brought her back home. Did he carry her to her bed, or put her in her father's arms? Christine finds herself closing her eyes, thinking about being in the strange man's arms, like a child, as he trudged through the snow to bring her back to her house. Was he angry, exasperated?

He seems benevolent enough; she only thinks about the veiled threats in his note for a moment. The stranger is well spoken, but his words are more formal than anything Christine has ever heard, except for in fantasy novels.

And then she remembers, her father's _condition._ What did he mean by that? Christine pushes that out of her mind too, and then, biting her lip, remembers the wrapped package. It's not well wrapped, but it looks like he put effort into it. She unwraps it and tosses the green foil paper on the floor.

It's brie. But not the packaged American brie she gave him in the basket: it's French, she recognizes the writing on it. Brie de Meaux. She says it out loud, running her finger over the packaging, then brings it up to her nose to smell it.

It's creamy, sweet smelling, a tiny little chunk but so pungent and wonderful looking. She wants badly to open it and eat it right at the kitchen table.

But still, she resists. Her stomach rumbles painfully, but she puts the entire chunk of cheese in the refrigerator and walks back to the kitchen table to retrieve the note. She sticks it in her pocket and fingers the edges, then walks back outside to smoke her cigarette.

The town house next door is dark. There is no indication that the mysterious Erik lives there at all. But still, after she lights her cigarette, she stands on her toes to look over the bush, and then waves to the dark windows. "Thank you!" she shouts, but she isn't sure if anyone hears.

---

"Dad, where were you?"

His mouth is strong, set, and he shows no emotion. "I was at the doctor's." He brushes past his daughter and leaps up the stairs.

"Did you talk to our new neighbor at all?"

He stops mid step and turns to Christine, looking down the stairs at her. "Only enough to figure out where you were at. Why?"

"No reason. You really didn't tell him anything about us?"

"Why, what does he know?"

Christine walks up the stairs a little. "Never mind, nothing, I'm just being paranoid. Hey, what did he look like?"

Her father seems to have no time for her questions. "I don't know, Chris, like a guy. He was wearing a scarf and sunglasses and a hat. I didn't really see much of his face." And he turns away, walking up the stairs and away from her, leaving her perplexed.

The thought crosses her mind that their strange neighbor might be the man she ran into at the psychiatrist's office. But she dismisses it. Erik isn't thin enough to be the man, and the voice, and the hands... but she rethinks herself. She hasn't seen him, really, other than a couple dark, obscured glances. _Whatever_, she thinks. _This is all pointless, who cares who he is._

She realizes she is standing on the stairs still, so she walks up the other flight to her bedroom and shuts herself inside, turning on her CD player. Jeff Buckley comes on; it's only making her strange, sad mood even worse, but she doesn't want to change the CD.

The view out the window still hypnotizes her. She can still see the neighbor's vacant looking living room through his window and she can see his snow covered porch. There are no footsteps leading to or away from his front door.

Her favorite song on the CD comes on, and she flops down on her bed, listening to the lilting notes, the words that are euphoric and despondent at once. The sound from the tiny boom box speakers is hollow, but she knows all the words, and mouths them silently, bathing in the fading afternoon light.

Then the singer is in her ears. The melody is quiet at first, then louder- it is all around her, cocooning her in soft sound. The voice is an angel's. She breathes raggedly, mouthing along still, gasping at the notes the voice holds, long and low. Christine loses herself in the song, and is carried away to a dark and gray place, where she sits in winter mist, and the voice is an entity all its own.

But suddenly, she realizes her light isn't on anymore; in fact, the entire house has gone dark, but the song continues, enticing her back into its spell. _The power went out. _Her heart pounds. She stands, and sees that the boom box is off, and the voice that fills the room isn't Buckley's at all.

Her head snaps to the window in time to see a dark figure disappear into her neighbor's house.


	4. The Angel's Comfort

**A/N: Thank you all so much for continuing to read and review my story. Your comments really affect what I write about and how.**

**I'm going to be out of town for the next couple days, and though I'll have my laptop, I don't know if I'm going to have internet access. So I might be slow on writing or posting another chapter.**

**If any of you guys have constructive criticism on my writing itself, please, please post it. I struggle with style as much as the next person, and your views on how I could improve help me so, so much, not only for this story but with my writing in general.  
**

---

"I'm not going to school, dad." Christine wraps her thick blanket around her head and kicks, bare footed, at her father. He's pulling on her ankles.

Her first instinct is to look out the window at her neighbor's porch. Had she been dreaming last night? She wants to look so much, but not in front of her dad, not until he leaves. Her head throbs.

Her father is yanking, pulling, dragging her out of bed, laughing at her, pulling her toes. Christine finally kicks him hard enough to get him to let go, then sits up, red eyed and bleary. "Fine, go away! I'm getting dressed, alright? Jesus Christ, leave me alone." She flops back down.

Her father turns his palms up in frustration and seems suddenly very peeved. "You have to go, Chris. We have to leave in fifteen minutes, so get dressed." He walks out of the room, turning back to give her a stern look, then closes the door behind him.

She stares at the door with one eye for a minute, then sits bolt up and takes her place at the window, balancing her elbows on the sill to look at her neighbor's house. It's dark, but the walk is shoveled, and she can see big boot prints going from his door to the sidewalk, then around back to the tenant parking lot. She smiles a little, remembering the voice, before pulling herself away from the window.

Christine goes through her morning routine: she looks in the mirror, cringes, ties her frizzy blonde hair back. She stands in front of her closet, shifting her weight, before pulling on a thick knit sweater and a denim skirt. Her dad is yelling to get downstairs. Her clock is blinking twelve.

So the power did go out. She smiles to herself again, then waves dreamily at her neighbor's dark living room, rubbing her eyes. He must be unreal, she thinks. Maybe she's the only one in the world who sees him.

Her father is standing at the bottom of the stairs with his arms crossed. "Quit dragging your feet!"

She rolls her eyes at him when he turns his back to lock the front door, and they both go downstairs together, out to the car through the back. Her father looks at her as he pulls out his keys.

Suddenly, he's soft with her, smiling when they get into the car. "I'm so proud of you."

"I want to drop out," she mumbles, but he doesn't seem to hear her.

"This is supposed to be the best year of your life." He's far away, remembering.

"It's not." She's pouting, crossing her arms, looking much younger than she is. It almost makes her laugh, thinking about how she must look, but she stifles it, wanting to be dramatic.

"Oh, shush. You're almost done, anyway. All you have to do is get through one more semester, and then..." Her trails off, looking at her, smiling halfway.

"And then four more years of college and I'm stuck in a stupid job that I'm destined to hate for the rest of my life!"

Her father is quiet for a few minutes, thinking, until suddenly he turns to her. His eyes say he doesn't know quite what to tell her, but he tries to look wise anyway. "You can do whatever you want with your life. This is only the beginning."

"Well, whatever, it feels like the end."

---

"Hey, Chris!"

"Shit, give me that." The girls lean close to each other, and Christine takes the half smoked cigarette from the pretty girl's mouth. "I've been out for days. Where's Andrew? He needs to buy me a pack like, right now." She takes a drag, then puts the cigarette back in the girl's mouth. Her lungs burn, but she holds in the smoke, finally crossing her arms and exhaling it up to the sky.

"Whatever, I don't know, here." She pulls a loose cigarette out of her purse and hands it to Christine. "I heard you had a run in with the ER, dude. Here, light. Cameron told me- look at you, talking shit about ODing! That's my girl. Seriously, what happened?"

She takes her time lighting the bummed cigarette. "A girl can't keep a freaking secret in this place, can she?" She tries to sound nonchalant, but panic bubbles in her throat.

"No, Cameron can't keep a secret."

Christine smokes, staring up at the sky, watching clouds pass lazily in the ice blue. Her panic isn't eased, but she presses it down with drag after drag of smoke. It stings her throat, so she clears it, then says, "Well, I so thought he'd be able to put a lid on it. It's not my fault that his appendix exploded the same day that they're wheeling me in on a freaking cart with IVs all stuck in me and telling me I'm suicidal and shit- which, by the way, I'm so not, if our friend Cameron didn't bother to tell you." She pulls the cigarette off her dry lips and looks at it, then looks back at the pretty girl, tilting her head up. "I took too many of those stupid vicodan you gave me is all. Straight up hydrocodone my ass, you need to read the label next time, Ms. shittiest drug dealer in the world." She looks around, half sneering, but everyone is just watching the conversation in awe. Christine feels brave for standing up to the beautiful girl. She also feels sick somewhere deep down in her soul.

"Ain't my fault." The pretty girl scratches her scalp self consciously, avoiding eye contact.

Another, younger girl sits down at their at their picnic table, watching the conversation bounce from person to person. She finally builds up the courage to speak. "Christine, you are so hardcore."

The older girls bust out laughing; Christine snickers a little bit. "Yeah," says the pretty girl, "idolize her for being more messed up than you." She claps a hand on Christine's shoulder and shakes her a little. "That's how we got here, isn't it?" And they laugh again; when they stop there is silence, before the pretty girl turns to Christine. "So, dude, what did you do over break?"

"You know, same old, nothing... but you know, I met this guy." Everyone goes _oooo, _but Christine just shakes her head and smiles, looking at her lap. "Yeah, you know, he's the tall dark and handsome type, and he's got the best taste in food, and he sings like nothing you've ever heard in your life, none of this choir shit, it's like an angel." She doesn't mention that she didn't try the cheese- or that she's never seen his face.

The girls all look at her in awe, and for a minute their false worship cuts Christine's loneliness.

The pretty girl slaps Christine on the back. "Way to go, dude, I was starting to think you were a dyke or something."

The younger girl pulls out a cigarette and lights it, looking around wide-eyed. "Are you going to bring him around, Christine?"

"Well, he's, you know, older." She finishes her cigarette and flicks it into the grass, kicking her feet at the cement under the picnic table.

"Statutory rape much?" The pretty girl laughs uproariously at her own joke.

Christine's loneliness returns. Only gone for a moment. She could never tell any of these kids the truth about herself, about the pills or about Erik's dark living room.

Pretty girl looks at her designer watch and shakes her head. "Hey, shit, it's class time. Anyone have Brit Lit?"

Everyone makes a sound in response, and the group stands up to walk back to the school. Christine doesn't move: she's looking at the picnic table, thinking. "You coming, Chris?"

"Nah." She scratches her jaw and turns to the group of girls, smiling feebly. "I think I'm actually going to pass on last period, and just head straight home."

"God, you are such a slackass."

Christine only smiles, waving at them with two fingers, gesturing for them to go on; they quickly do. She sits at the table long after they've left, closing her eyes every few minutes to try to block out the sound of traffic and remember the angel's voice.

---

The note is posted on the back door, and Christine can see it from several feet away, her heart skipping a beat. She strides up to it, quickly but steadily, staring at it for a minute before ripping it off. It's computer paper, done in colored pencils.

She unfolds it, knowing what it is, then smiles. It's a drawing, done by little children, of a big happy family happily picnicking in their front yard. There are the town homes, and the drawn Christine stands outside one, waving to the picnicking family. Her hair is sunflower yellow.

It is divided into five even sections, each one labeled with a different kid's name. From left to right, Christine runs her fingers over the age progression- 3 year old scribbles, all the way to a 22-year-old's realistic sketches.

22 year old. She reads the name. Raoul. She hasn't seen him for years, since he left for the marines, when he was an 18 year old who wore Metallica shirts and ran varsity track. He was so thin it was frightening. What does he look like now, Christine wonders. He must be back on leave.

She was only 13 when he went away. Would he remember her as the short, pudgy little blonde girl, or would he even remember her at all? She folds the drawing back up and turns to the house with the children, waving to the window even though she can't tell if anyone is inside.

The house is quiet, her father won't be home until five or six. She walks into the kitchen, opening the fridge and staring at all the items, until finally deciding on a piece of celery. The cheese taunts her. She shuts the fridge, to the discomfort of her growling stomach, and makes her way up the stairs to her room to stare out her window at her neighbor's porch.

The phone's ring pulls her out of her trance, and she just stares at it for a moment, contemplating whether to answer. The caller ID is a number she doesn't recognize, but she decides to pick it up anyway, and grabs her phone just after the fifth ring. She can hear the answering machine click.

"Hello?"

"Hello, this is the emergency RN at Lutheran Hospital, may I ask who I'm speaking with?" The woman is stern, her voice quiet and steady.

"This is Christine and look, we don't have any money to donate this year, but thank you anyway." She goes to hang up the phone, but the voice on the other end clears its throat.

"Are you Mr. Daae's spouse?"

"Daughter, why?" Her heart is beating faster. What do they want? She just wants to hang up, but the nurse is pausing solemnly to keep her on the phone. Christine glances out her window to her neighbor's house. She thinks she sees a dark figure in the living room, and it calms her.

"We'd like to ask you, if possible, to come to the hospital immediately concerning your father, Christine." The woman's voice goes soft and comforting, like she's talking to a crying child, but the change in tone doesn't cushion her words.

"What? What about? What's wrong with my daddy?"

"We can't tell you over the phone." The nurse covers the mouthpiece, but Christine can still hear her bark out an order to someone in the background. "Do you know where we're located?"

"Yeah, yeah." And Christine hangs up the phone and sets it down, sitting on her bed stunned for a moment, before the situation sinks in and she jumps up.

She runs outside, but the bus has just passed, and with eyes wide she looks around for something, anything, a way to get there. She wishes so hard that she would have just gotten her driver's license, instead of letting her permit lapse and her dad drive her around. She swings her head to all sides, looking, but the weight of the situation is too much for her and she sits down in the hard gravel of the parking lot, sobbing uncontrollably.

She hears the footsteps come up, but doesn't want to react until they come to a halt right behind her, and she waits a moment before turning around. The sight that is there stuns her for a moment: the man is tall, well muscled, with striking features and close trimmed brown hair. He seems familiar, but looks nothing like the skinny track boy she knew years ago. "Raoul?"

He smiles tentatively at her, then bends down to wipe her tears. "What's wrong, little Lotte?"

She almost laughs, before suddenly remembering her plight, even in the face of his attractiveness. All her words come in one breath, "Raoul, the hospital- Lutheran's- they called and my dad is there and they wouldn't tell me what but I need to go there right away they said and I don't have any way to get there Raoul can you please give me a ride and I'll be forever grateful, this is so important, please?" Her blue eyes plead when she looks at his face.

"Of course, Chris. Come on." He doesn't want to worry her by being in too much of a hurry, but he takes her by the hand and stands her up, guiding her briskly to his car.

---

The hospital has always bothered Christine. The sterility is meant to be comforting, but she can smell the death in the air. All around are the ghosts of hundreds of people who died inside the building, and the thought of it gives Christine the creeps.

Raoul sits next to her in the waiting room, clutching her cold, small hands in his. He has brought her a sandwich from the cafeteria, but she told him that the nerves make her lose her appetite, and she only picked off a few bites. Raoul wraps his arms around Christine; she is so small, so frail. He remembers her as a young girl with a round face and a little puppy fat, but she looks sick now. He wonders about her, worrying.

All they know is that Christine's father passed out at work, and he's stable but unconscious. They saw him for a moment, in the ICU, and he looked so thin, with his eyes closed and the delicate skin under his eyelids sunken and black. Her father looked like an old man. The image scares Christine still.

None of the nurses will tell her anything about why he passed out at work or why he's still unconscious, only that he'll be okay, he'll be okay, I'll make sure he's okay. The nurses have a predictable script. Christine rests her head on Raoul's shoulder and cries a couple cold tears.

The main RN steps out of the main office and gestures for Christine to come over, but when Raoul follows, she puts out a hand to stop him. "Only family, please." Christine shrugs apologetically at him, but he smiles, nodding for her to go on.

The nurse walks her through labyrinthine hallways with door after door filled with posted clip boards, name tags, medical information, until they get to an isolated hall with plastic on the entrance. "Here," says the nurse, holding the plastic aside for Christine to step though. The smell of the disinfectants is overwhelming. Christine almost bursts into tears.

Her father's room is the last door on the right, one that has no name tag or clip board, only a sheet with a doctor's name printed on it and some medical notes written in shorthand that Christine can't decipher. The nurse stops her right in front of the door and bends down, bringing herself closer to Christine's height.

"He's awake, but delirious. He'll be glad to see you, but don't expect your dad to be 100, okay?"

Christine nods and opens the heavy wooden door, almost falling to her knees when she sees her dad hooked up to countless machines, laying in bed, a small figure. She runs to his bedside. "Dad, oh, dad, I'm so sorry." She kneels by his bed, laying across him, sobbing. He puts one hand on top of her head.

---

It is dark in the hospital room. Christine sits bolt upright and looks at the clock: it reads 2:47. She must have fallen asleep crying- but what about Raoul? Did he go home? She forces herself not to worry, tells herself that he left and assumed she'd want to stay overnight with her dad.

Dad. She looks at him, eyes wide, but he is sleeping peacefully, chest rising and falling in a steady rhythm. He doesn't look as bad, Christine thinks, his condition is improving.

She smiles and looks around, reading the labels on all the equipment, trying to figure out exactly what it is they've got hooked up to her father. Her eyes land on a chair in the corner of the room, and she stands up, her legs weak from kneeling on the hard floor.

She looks to her dad again to make sure he's not disturbed, then turns back to the chair. But there, in the chair, is a dark, hunched over figure, stroking its jaw and watching Christine intently. She almost screams, but claps her hand over her mouth, then closes her eyes, just for an instant, out of fear. When she reopens them, the figure is gone.

Her heart pounds. There is nothing there. The chair is empty. She walks over, pats it, inspects it, timing her breathing to calm herself. The chair is empty. She sits in it.

"Little Lotte?" The voice is in her ear, calm and melodious, so comforting. She absorbs it for a second before realizing that the voice was actually there, as though the man behind it was standing right over her shoulder.

"Who are you?" Christine stands up, ready to fight.

The voice is smooth as silk, as though it could become song at any moment. "Your father looks so sick. Poor Christine, you are tired and your day was long. School makes you anxious, doesn't it?"

She nods, still trying to pinpoint the source of the voice, but it is in her ear, or worse, in her head. Her father doesn't seem to hear it, as he doesn't wake.

"Come now love, sit down, and I will sing you to sleep." Christine can only nod again and follow the voice's command.

The words are meaningless, sounds and babble, but the voice's song is beautiful. It reminds her of nights spent curled up in her mother's arms, long ago, as though she can almost remember her mother. The voice caresses her skin, coaxes her to relaxing, to going limp, and the voice fills her head with images of summers, spent happy and lazy, to spin her dreams around.

Before she nods off, she hears the voice speak between bars of song, "Christine, you are so beautiful. Only your angel can see your true beauty."

Christine, childlike and sleepy, whispers, "Angel, I love... angel," before she finally nods off.


	5. Lessons

**There are four instances of the F-word in this chapter. If that bothers you, well, sucks for you.**

** Sorry for the long hiatus. I've been busy with school and when I originally wrote this chapter, I was very unhappy with it and abandoned it for a while. Well, here it is. Anyone want to be a beta reader? Message me.  
**

---

"I love..."

Raoul is standing over her, one strong hand on her shoulder. Christine's face is pressed into the chair, and her hair has come out of the ponytail; it floats in a halo, staticky, around her head.

He just smiles halfway and offers a hand to help her up. "They're moving your dad to the fourth floor."

She suddenly remembers where she is, the spell of sleep broken, and jumps to her feet without his assistance. Sun streams through the window even though it faces a brick wall; it's as though she's blinking away the fog of last night's dream. Or was it a hallucination? Her angel was there with her. "Erik." The word is so soft, Christine is almost unsure that she's spoken it aloud.

Raoul raises an eyebrow slightly. "Who's Erik?"

"No one, I mean, someone I was dreaming about."

"Someone who you want here with you? Because I can call anyone you want to come here, you know, if you want." He turns away a little bit, disappointed, but Christine steps next to him, trying to rub her eyes and fix her hair at the same time.

She frowns a little. "Just someone in my head. I think."

"Oh," he says, tilting his head birdlike. He doesn't press the issue when she maintains silence. "Anyway, your dad is in room 402. I can show you the way there. He seems a lot better, he's been up and talking, he and I caught up a bit, the nurse said we should probably let you sleep a little though."

"Why didn't you wake me... what time is it?" She pulls her hair back and digs in her pockets for a hair band.

"Almost ten." Raoul watches her fuss with her hair, then grabs her wrists and forces her to look him straight in the face. "It's not good news, Chris. He's doing okay this morning, but it's not good news. You can hear it from him."

Her heart pounds. She nods.

The two go up through a side elevator to the fourth floor, the respiratory ward. She's not shocked by where they are; it could be worse, she supposes. Doors are open down these hallways and families are inside, talking to high-spirited, laughing patients. There's a better feeling. Her tight muscles ease, even though Raoul has put a protective arm around her shoulders.

The door to room 402 is cracked and they can hear a male voice inside, joking with a high pitched, nasal female voice. Her father and the nurse. He's in high spirits, his voice raspy and cracking but still his own.

"Dad?" She peeks her head around the door, Raoul's grip tightening on her shoulders, and both the nurse and her father look over and crack smiles.

Her dad tries to sit farther up, but dissolves into a fit of coughing. The nurse eyes him with a disdain usually reserved for misbehaving children. He waves at Christine, blinking tears from his eyes, then looks back at the nurse. "Sorry to cut this social call short, but I'd really like to talk to my daughter, if you don't mind."

"I'm almost finished." The nurse is short and stout, with pretty blue eyes and soft, feminine features. "Just let me get your blood pressure."

They all stand awkwardly, waiting for the nurse to do her job, and she makes some marks on the clipboard, then tells them she'll be back at 11 and to press the button if they need anything. After the nurse is gone, Christine throws herself at her dad's bedside. Raoul watches awkwardly until the older man turns away from his daughter and gestures for him to leave, adding, "Can you go get Chris some breakfast?"

She shakes her head, saying, "No, I'm not hungry."

"Shh, you need to eat." Her father strokes her hair. Raoul only nods and walks out of the room.

Christine sits looking at him silently for a long time, before touching the top of his hand. Her weight makes only a slight dent in the blankets. "You look a lot better today dad, how are you feeling?"

Her father turns his hand over and squeezes her fingers, then strokes her back a little. "I feel okay, you know, I just can't wait to get out of this place."

Her heart flips a little, responding to a deep down ache that tells her nothing is going to be okay. "Yeah, well, how much longer?"

"A few days, I don't know."

They don't broach the subject of what's wrong for a long time, her father's eyes going glazed with thought, before her snaps out of it suddenly and plasters a smile on his face. "It's all going to be fine, you know."

"Is it?" Christine suddenly feels much older, all her joints tired and aching, all her cells whispering to just lay down and forget the world.

Her father squeezes her hand gently. "It's going to be a fight to be okay again, Chris."

"What do you mean?"

"Well," he pauses and continues squeezing her hand, hesitating when she looks at him with wet blue eyes. "They found a mass in my left lung."

Christine looks at him with wide, expectant eyes, panic hitting her full force and filling ever nook of her abdomen. "What?"

"They're going to do a biopsy this evening."

She sits, shocked, for a few moments, her mouth moving but no sounds coming out. Finally, she musters another "What?"

He looks down, seeming ashamed. He can't hide the fear in his eyes. "It may be cancer."

The door cracks open and Raoul pokes his head in, followed by a paper bag clutched in both his hands. "Breakfast?"

----

Raoul sits with his hamburger and fries, taking a bite every few minutes between sidelong glances at Christine. The car is running loud against the January cold, and Christine is picking at a dry salad with one knee pulled up to her chest.

They sit in the parking lot behind her town home, unwilling or unable to move from the car and face the reality of her empty house.

He puts down his food and turns to her, grabbing the little black plastic bowl of salad and replacing it with the box of French fries. She looks down at them blankly. "I hate fries."

"No one hates fries."

She brings her other knee to her chest and rests her forehead on it. "Well, I do. I feel sick anyway."

"You feel sick because you've barely eaten all day."

"Sure I have, I had that burrito this morning-"

"Three bites, then threw it away, don't think I didn't see you."

"Well, would you be hungry if it was your..." She chokes up and rubs her eyes.

"Chris... you have to eat."

He extends one protective arm around her shoulders, but it makes her feel trapped and she shudders. Her mind wanders to the hospital room, to the sleeping form of her father the first night and the dark form in the corner chair, the hallucination of the voice in her ear that sang her to sleep with soft dark refrains. The memory makes her heart pound; at least it keeps her mind off the morning's conversation with her dad.

The box of fries glistens disgustingly, soaked with grease and salt and filled with limp yellow tubers that are already getting cold and stale. She can see a film of white lard forming on their surface. Her father, Raoul's arm around her shoulders again- has that been happening a lot?- the hallucinations, and not least of all the French fries, it's too much for Christine and all of it explodes out of her at once in a fury. The fries scatter on the pavement outside of the car as she yanks herself away from his grasp and hurtles from him, standing with the car door open staring wildly. "Thank you for the ride, Raoul." Her voice is surprisingly quiet.

Stunned, he can do nothing but watch as she slams the door and runs into her house.

---

The phone rings relentlessly but she can't gather the strength to answer it. She's curled on her bedroom floor, her left hip bone pressing down uncomfortably, but the world is insurmountable and she can't even move to make herself more comfortable. She is sure the caller is Raoul.

"Christine!" A small stone hits her window, then another and another. "Chris!"

"Leave me alone!" Her voice doesn't come out as loud or as forcefully as she wants it to, and she isn't sure if he hears. "Raoul, I need to be alone."

The phone rings and rings. So it isn't him.

"Your dad has been calling me! He just wanted me to tell you to pick up the phone."

"Daddy?" Christine's expression shifts immediately, from blank pain to twisted fear and excitement. Her movements aren't swift, but they are deliberate, as she pushes herself up of the floor and pads into her dad's room to grab the phone. It rings twice with her staring at it before she can pick it up. She's so afraid the voice on the other end has bad news.

"Hello?"

There is a long silence and Christine almost hangs up before a low, vaguely familiar man's voice comes on the line. "Christine."

"Who is this?"

"Would you like me to bring you anything?" The voice is slow and musical.

"Erik?"

The voice exhales, composing itself, and the phone buzzes, as if to fill the silence for Christine.

"How did you get my number?" Christine's heart is pounding with fear. She wants to slam the phone down on this cruel joke.

"I'm going to buy food and clothing. Would you like me to buy you anything?"

Christine can barely support herself; she falls on her father's bead, worn out, heart exploding out of her chest, hands shaking. The phone reception is awful. "This isn't fucking funny!"

The voice exhales audibly again, hissing. "Ms. Daae..."

Christine sits bolt up, adrenaline pumping with a sudden realization. "Don't you fucking call me again." She hangs up the phone then throws it at the opposite wall. It takes her a moment to gather herself and pull her mind from her anger, but she finally does and stands up, looking to her room. She can see out her window. Raoul is still standing outside.

He can see her too. "What did he say?"

"You're not funny, Raoul!" Her voice is high, piercing, hardly hers at all. "Why don't you fuck off?" She slams her window shut, and watches his face mold into an expression of confusion and fear. A tiny crack creeps across the glass at the top of her window.

The phone rings again.

---

Christine wakes up to a tear rolling over her nose and a quality of light that makes her wonder whether it's morning or night. She sits up and looks around blearily, then stumbles up and into her dad's bathroom, opening the window. She feels feverish and welcomes the cold blast of air that splays across her face.

The mirror shows her a face she barely recognizes, puffy eyes, dark circles, swollen lips and running mascara. Her blonde hair, as usual, swirls around her head in an angry tempest. But Christine isn't disgusted this time; she sees a little girl, a frightened one, who is bone thin and hurting herself. How selfish, all the times her dad went to bed frustrated, angry, sad because of her actions. She hadn't meant to hurt him. The tears come easily. She wants to stop hurting herself, but she doesn't know how.

All she can think of is a song. It snaps into her head suddenly, and she doesn't know where it came from or what it is, only that she knows the words somehow.

"When you walk through a storm hold your head up high, and don't be afraid of the dark." It's been so long since she's sang even a word, her voice is unsure, cracking a little bit.

The door bell rings. Christine wipes her eyes and avoids looking in the mirror again, terrified of shattering the illusion, then walks down the stairs and stands on her tip toes to peer through the peep hole in the front door. There is no one there. She rolls her eyes and jerks the door open to yell at whoever is messing with her, but instead of a preteen prankster, she finds bags of groceries: fresh vegetables, sauces, bags of crackers, canned soups, milk, eggs, ice cream, frozen dinners, more than she can eat in weeks and weeks. In front of the bags is a letter written in smeared red pen on notebook paper.

Christine bends down to pick it up, looks around, then reads it.

_I hope I didn't frighten you on the phone earlier. Perhaps something in these bags will tempt you to eat. I give my condolences. _

_Obediently yours,_

_Erik._

She crumples up the note, about to step back into the house and slam the door, but her stomach growls. Her pale palms travel over her stomach, the thin skin stretched tight over muscles, her hips jutting out. Maybe just a salad. She picks up the bags, looping four over her arms at once, waddling into the kitchen to set them on the floor just like she always did with her father.

The song comes back to her mind.

"_At the end of a storm is a golden sky_

_and the sweet silver song of a lark.  
Walk on through the wind,  
walk on through the rain,  
tho' your dreams be tossed and blown."_

Her voice lifts, stronger now than it was in the bathroom, more confident. There is a sweet tone in it. The song holds something mysterious, something she can't quite access in her memory.

She is about to pick up the last couple bags when she looks up to see the dark figure standing at the end of her walkway. It is the tall thin man from outside the psychiatrist's office, the shadow silently approaching her in the house next door, the figure sitting in the chair at the hospital, the flustered neighbor waving from over the bush.

It is more of a shocked sigh than a spoken word. "Erik!"

He is wearing a long black wool coat buttoned over slacks, a winter hat, and, most curiously, a black Halloween mask with gold designs that loop around the eyes and cross over the nose, then outline the lips. She has to squint to make out these details.

Erik just stands there, watching, and for a moment they are locked in a gaze without moving. A cloud has slipped in from the south unnoticed, and without warning a flash of lightning interrupts their reverie, startling them both into looking up at the sky. When Christine looks back at him, he has moved so he is within six feet of her, standing straight and stiff. She almost drops the bags of groceries.

"Ms. Daae."

"You brought these?" She looks down at the last bags of groceries that she holds in her hands.

He nods a little, stone still. It's almost eerie, Christine thinks, how still he stands. "Yes, I thought you would be indisposed caring for your father in these sad days, and assumed you wouldn't have time to buy food for yourself."

"How do you know about my dad?"

"You have a beautiful singing voice, but it's too raw. You lack control. It would benefit from some training."

She is stunned, and almost forgets his evasion of her question. "You really think so?"

"Of course. May I?" He gestures at the door.

Her heart pounds. There is something in the back of her mind that tells her not to let him in, but he steps past her without waiting for a response, striding confidently into her home. His foot steps are as quiet as a cat's.

"Thanks for the food." There is only a nod in response. The stranger walks around her living room, running his finger over the coffee table, picking up trinkets and stroking them and putting them down. The long, graceful fingers have a spirit of their own. No matter how stoic the man is, his fingers seem to be possessed with a great sadness.

She watches his hands for a minute before she is finally sure. "That was you outside the shrink's office, wasn't it?" Before he can answer, she asks, "What were you doing there?" There is another flash of lightning and a far off crash of thunder.

"I was visiting an old friend. That was a nice song you were singing."

She is caught off guard yet again. "You heard me?" He nods. "It just came into my head."

"You miss your mother, don't you?"

Suddenly, it falls into place, the feeling she had clears like a thick fog. She has a dreamlike flashback of being small, peering through the bars of her crib and testing her legs. She tries to place her age- no more than two? Standing beside her crib is her mother, just like she looked in pictures. Tall, striking, blonde, with a strong jaw and manicured hands. She is singing the song. Her voice is pure and clean, old fashioned almost. Christine remembers reaching out and grabbing tiny handfuls of her mother's hair, being careful not to pull too hard. She remembers the bangly diamond earrings her mother was wearing and the light floral scent of her perfume.

"You sing it just like she did."

"You knew my mother?"

He turns fully to her, standing with arms open and down at his sides. "Not very well. Would you like voice lessons?"

She is growing annoyed at his evasion, but the thought of his wonderful voice tempts her so much she forgets her annoyance. "I don't have any money."

"We'll cross that bridge when we come to it. Don't worry, for now." Christine can only stare at him. "I'll be over tomorrow, after school. You really ought to go, Christine. It's not that much longer to finish."

She nods. "I might."

"Please do." He turns and walks out the door, pausing long enough on her porch for Christine to get her bearings and drop the bags of groceries, striding after him.

"Hey, wait! How did you know about my dad?"

"I have a lot of time to watch." He says this without even turning around.

She nods and thinks for a minute, before another, more pressing question occurs to her. "Were you there, at the hospital?"

But he doesn't hear, or doesn't want to. In half a moment, he is gone, disappeared into his house. Christine doesn't dare follow. Lightning flickers, mockingly, on the far off horizon.


End file.
